Article of clothing including a combined belt and suspender arrangement

ABSTRACT

An article of clothing is provided including a belt portion with suspender parts connected thereto. The suspender parts are of such length as to maintain the belt portion above the waist of the wearer. The different elements of the article may be of different material such as interengaged leather loops or cloth or the like. The belt may be closed by a thong and the suspender parts may be interconnected. In one arrangement, the suspender parts are connected at the front of the body of the wearer to the belt by a part which interconnects the open ends of the belt.

States Patent [191 1 Jan. 15, 1974 ARTllClLE 0F CLOTHING INCLUDING A COMBINED BELT AND SUSPENDER ARRANGEMENT [76] Inventor: Delores Bryant, 936 West End Ave.,

New York, NY. 10025 [22] Filed: Jan. 17, 1972 [21] Appl. No.: 218,426

[51] Int. Cl. A4lf 19/00 [58] Field of Search 2/310, 338, 322,

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 721,305 2/1903 Hunkins 2/310 1,427,104 8/1922 Hall 2/310 X 3,105,974 10/1963 DeGrazia 2/310 1,431,846 10/1922 Slavens 2/322 82,901 10/1968 Ward 2/327 X 98,564 l/l970 Conklin 2/327 594,201 11/1897 Frothingham 2/322 1,792,158 2/1931 Gleckner 1,847,182 3/1932 Heyer 2/322 1,392,319 10/1921 Frank 2/338 1,719,145 7/1929 Stoter 2/338 Primary Examiner-G. V. Larkin Att0rney-Alan K. Roberts et a1.

[5 7 ABSTRACT An article of clothing is provided including a belt portion with suspender parts connected thereto. The suspender parts are of such length as to maintain the belt portion above the waist of the wearer. The different elements of the article may be of different material such as interengaged leather loops or cloth or the like. The belt may be closed by a thong and the suspender parts may be interconnected. In one arrangement, the suspender parts are connected at the front of the body of the wearer to the belt by a part which interconnects the open ends of the belt.

1 Claim, 8 Drawing Figures FIELD OF THE INVENTION This invention relates to articles of clothing and more particularly to articles of clothing which serve as accessories.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the invention to provide an improved article of clothing adapted to be worn as an accessory or supplemental to other articles of clothing which are worn. It is another object of the invention to provide an improved article of clothing adapted to be worn in conjunction with other articles of clothing or in connection with the nude look.

Yet another object of the invention is to provide an improved article of clothing constituting a novel accessory not heretofore available and intended to initiate a new style of fashion in the clothing field.

In achieving the above and other objects of the invention, there is provided an article of clothing to be worn on the human body comprising a belt portion to encircle the torso' of the body with suspender parts being connected to the belt portion and adapted to engage over the shoulders of the body, the suspender parts being of such a length as to hold the belt portion above the waist of the body.

The belt portion may be open at the front of the body, in which event, means will be provided to close the belt thereat. The belt may be closed, for example, by a thong arrangement or by a buckle or by a part which serves both as to close the belt and to connect the suspender parts to the belt portion.

In accordance with the invention, the belt portion and suspender parts may comprise, in major proportion, a plurality of serially arranged interengaged loops of similar shape or of different shapes. The lowermost of these loops may be effective to engage the belt portion.

In accordance with a feature of the invention, the suspender parts may each include separate sections, there being provided in this case means to connect the sections at the shoulders of the body.

In the aforesaid arrangement in which loops are employed to constitute the belt portion and suspender parts, the loops may consist of doubled parts including bights passing through slots provided in the next adjacent loops.

The above and other objects and features of the invention will be found more fully disclosed in the following detailed description of some preferred embodiments of the invention as illustrated in the accompanying drawing, in which:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a suspender and belt combination provided in accordance with one embodiment of the invention;

FIG. 2 is a section taken along line 22 of FIG. ll;

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view taken along line 3-3 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken along line 44 of FIG. 1',

FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken along line 55 of FIG. ll;

FIG. 6 is a fragmentary plan view of a suspender part in accordance with a further embodiment of the inventron;

FIG. 7 is a fragmentary perspective view of the bottom portion of a suspender and belt combination arrangement provided in accordance with another embodiment of the invention; and

FIG. 8 is a fragmentary view showing a modification of the back portion which is applicable to any of the aforegoing embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION FIG. I is a perspective view of a suspender and belt combination provided in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the invention.

The illustrated arrangement consists of a belt portion MP and two suspender parts 12 and 14. The belt portion lltl is intended to encircle the torso of the body of the wearer and the suspender parts 12 and 14 are of such length that the belt portion is supported above the waist of such body.

The belt portion is open at front as indicated at 16 and, to secure the belt around the torso of the wearer, there is provided a thong 18 which is passed through slots 20 and 22 in the belt elements to be described in greater detail hereinafter.

Although a bow is employed to tie the thong as indicated at 24, it will be appreciated that a buckle may also be employed in substitution for the thong or that other suitable closing arrangements may also be employed, some of which will be described in greater detail hereinafter.

The suspender parts are each fabricated in two sections, that is front and back sections connected at the shoulders as indicated at 26 and 28. This will permit separation at the shoulders to permit adjustment or for other reasons. The suspender parts may moreover be interconnected, as indicated, by a thong 30.

As appears in FIG. 2, which illustrates the upper portion of one of the suspender parts, each suspender part consists of a plurality of serially arranged loops 32, 34, 36, 36 and so on, the two loops 32 and 36 being the uppermost loops located at the shoulder and being interconnected by means of a thong 40.

To enable this interconnection, the direction of these two loops is reversed relative to one another so that the bights 42 and 44 thereof are directed downwardly. It will be noted that these bights pass through, for example, slots 46 and 48 which are provided and aligned in the legs of the next adjacent loop.

The general arrangement of loops is better seen in FIG. 3 wherein is seen a sequence of loops 50, 52, 54 and 56. Therein it will be seen that each of the loops is provided with a bight 58, 6*!) or 62 passing through slots 64 and 66 or 68 and'7tl or 72 and 74.

The aforesaid loops may be fabricated of leather, leatherette, rubber, plastic or other materials synthetic and natural and are preferably of such material as may be colorfully dyed or decorated in accordance with the general theme of the invention.

F IG. 4 illustrates that the bottommost loop of each of the suspender parts such as indicated at 76 is adapted to encircle and thus engage one or more of the belt loops or loop sections such as indicated at 73 in the drawing.

FIG. 5 is, as mentioned above, a sectional view through line 4-4 of FIG. 1, the engagement of the belt portion by one of the suspender parts being seen in greater detail herein. Thus, it is seen relative to FIG. 4 that loop 76 encircles loop 78 in turn connected to a series of other loops such as indicated at 80 and 82. Thong 16 is also indicated in FIG. 5.

FIG. 6 illustrates a further embodiment of the invention wherein the loops mentioned hereinabove are replaced by hour-shaped parts such as those indicated at 88 and 90. Actually, these parts are identical parts having matching configuration, these parts being connected by, for example, thongs 92, 94 and 96 which pass through holes provided at respective ends of the aforesaid parts. Thus, for example, part 88 is provided with holes 98, 100 and 102, at one end, and holes 104, 106 and 108 at the other end.

The part 110 is a rectangular part also provided with holes through which the respective thongs pass, it being noted that the thongs may be provided in sections knotted in the vicinity of the part 110 which is intended to rest on the shoulder of the wearer so that the suspender portions may be separated in this region.

The article illustrated in FIG. 7 is still a further embodiment of the invention and is fabricated of cloth, such as, for example, knitted or crocheted fabric or the like. Herein is seen a belt portion 120 having spaced ends 122 and 124, the lower extremities 126, 128, 130 and 132 of the suspender parts being visible in this Figure.

Instead of being connected directly to the belt portion, the suspender extremities 130 and 132 are instead connected to an intermediate part 134 which serves to connect the ends 122 and 124 of the belt portion and thus close the belt. Buttons 136 and 138 are provided for this purpose and are affixed to the intermediate part 134. The buttons pass through appropriate holes provided in the ends 122 and 124.

From the above, it will be seen that there has been provided an improved article of clothing adapted to constitute a new fashion in the field of clothing design.

Such article is adapted to be worn on the human body and comprises a belt portion which encircles the torso of the body with suspender parts being connected to the belt portion and adapted to pass over the shoulders of the body. The suspender parts are of a length to hold the belt portion above the waist of the body, the belt portion being operable at the front of the body and being provided with means to close the belt.

FIG. 8 shows that the back can be criss-crossed such as by crossing suspender part 140 over part 142. This modification can be employed in any of the aforegoing embodiments. In this modification, the parts 140 and 142 can be connected at 144 by interengaging the loops or by thongs or the like or also the parts 140 and 142 can be left entirely independent of each other.

There will now be obvious to those skilled in the art many modifications and variations of the structure set forth hereinabove. These modifications and variations will not, however, depart from the scope of the invention, as defined by the following claim.

What is claimed is:

1. An article to be worn on the human body comprising a belt portion to encircle the torso of the body, suspender parts connected to the belt portion and adapted to engage over the shoulders of the body, said suspender parts being of a length to hold said belt portion above the waist of said body, said belt portion being open at the front of the body, means to close the belt portion at the front of the body, the belt portion and suspender parts each comprising in major proportion a plurality of serially arranged interengaged loops of similar shape, the lowermost of said loops of the suspender parts engaging said belt portion, each said suspender part including separate sections and means including thongs to connect said sections at the shoulders of the body and means connecting the suspender parts across the back of said body, said loops being doubled parts including bights passing through slots provided in the next adjacent loops, the bights of the loopsof each shoulder part being directed towards the belt portion. l 

1. An article to be worn on the human body comprising a belt portion to encircle the torso of the body, suspender parts connected to the belt portion and adapted to engage over the shoulders of the body, said suspender parts being of a length to hold said belt portion above the waist of said body, said belt portion being open at the front of the body, means to close the belt portion at the front of the body, the belt portion and suspender parts each comprising in major proportion a plurality of serially arranged interengaged loops of similar shape, the lowermost of said loops of the suspender parts engaging said belt portion, each said suspender part including separate sections and means including thongs to connect said sections at the shoulders of the body and means connecting the suspender parts across the back of said body, said loops being doubled parts including bights passing through slots provided in the next adjacent loops, the bights of the loops of each shoulder part being directed towards the belt portion. 